Icelandic Chickens

We have worked for three years with two, younger, serious breeders as we pass on the actual hatching and shipping of our well bred Icelandics. Our hens are a mixture of all 4 Imports and we use 100% pure Sigrid Line Roosters with them. This program has given us beautiful chicks and we are very pleased with the results.

We have started taking and receiving orders for 2017. We will be continuing with our Icelandic Breeding Program. Our hens are a mixture of all 4 Imports and we use 100% pure Sigrid Line Roosters with them. This program has given us beautiful chicks and we are very pleased with the results.

Once again, we plan to hold our prices another year. Costs keep going up but we will maintain, at least for orders received before January 1, 2017. We will review at that time. 2017 List position is in order of payment received. While we are not in a position to offer refunds, we are able to work with you and roll your order over to a more convenient time.

Current 2017 pricing (same as 2015):

Chicks: (straight run)

$10 – 1-24

$9 – 25 plus

We must ship 25 chicks at a time…mailing is $48.00 per box of 25 chicks (includes insurance)

We accept checks and Money orders. Email: fayrehale@gmail.com for address.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE!

As I catch up on chicken emails, I realize a posting might be helpful! Our season starts in May. There are many reasons we are not going to change that.

— it insures that the weather should be more consistent and fine for chicks and eggs to travel!

Our unusual weather has everyone excited and thinking Spring! Think Spring all you want! It isn’t here yet. Here in Vermont we were enjoying 60 degrees and rain (and mud:) last week. Today we are white with snow.

— I have carefully scheduled surgery so that it misses winter and I am healed before hatching season and the opening of Shops At Fayrehale. I can’t do more than schedule carefully to limit inconvenience! and be thankful it isn’t life threatening or an emergency.

— Our Chickens are an important segment of our lives, HOWEVER, we are not a hatchery and they are not our entire life! We find more and more people treating us like a commercial hatchery — We are dedicated breeders of two very important Heritage breeds –

We are maintaining our 2015 pricing even though our costs have gone up. It seems the best thing to do in these difficult times — we want people to have their own chickens and to buy from small breeders and not commercial facilities.

Our 2016 list is growing. List position is in order of payment received – The list is manageable and has room for you. IF there are unforeseen circumstances that cause the list to not be completed, those people roll to the top of the next year’s list. People serious about having good quality birds from small breeders understand this — I waited 18 months once for birds I wanted (paid at time of order)

Current pricing (same as 2015):

Chicks: (straight run)

$10 – 1-24

$9 – 25 plus

We must ship 25 chicks at a time…mailing is $48.00 per box of 25 chicks (includes insurance)

We accept checks and Money orders. Email: fayrehale@gmail.com for address.

Keep Scrolling Down This Page For Further Information!

First I will publish a general and public response to the many, many inquiries we are receiving from people interested in Icelandic Chickens. THEN I will work away at catching up on individual emails and inquiries!

The recent surge of interest seems to have resulted from a national article on Icelandics. There are a few things you need to know!

The Icelandics are a special and wonderful breed that has been imported by a very few dedicated believers in preserving this ancient landrace breed. Icelandic are currently owned and bred by small breeders that support this mission.

Many inquires sound as if they think they are dealing with a hatchery! They make specific requests for shipping dates, sexed chicks and even specific colors!

We are not a hatchery! We are a small dedicated breeder in Vermont! We do not even start putting eggs in our incubator until the latter part of April and we start shipping chicks in May.

We maintain a list of orders (in the order payment is received) and that list starts in October for the next season. We run our incubator from April in to the fall and send out orders. Any not filled (or delayed by person ordering) go to the top of the list for the next season.

We ship chicks the day they hatch, STRAIGHT RUN, and due to the genetic makeup of the Icelandics, you will get a multitude of colors, comb styles and possible crests.

This sudden surge of Spring interest/desire to order is more than most small flock owners can handle OR want to handle!.

IF you are serious — I suggest you place your order with the breeder of your choice and wait your turn! KNOWING it might be the next season.

As a serious breeder, I have paid for chicks in the past and waited 18-24 months to receive them. Serious people do that when they want good birds.

It is hard to say exactly how fast the list will progress — right now I would say we are looking at some time in August and we will ship into the first part of September so that there is time to raise them to adequate size before winter.

Those serious about joining the Icelandic “Family” will understand this.

Thank you! Individual responses going out as fast as I can get to them!

2015 Pricing

Chicks: (straight run)

$10 – 1-24

$9 – 25 plus

We must ship 25 chicks at a time…

We are required to ship Express at this time. Please have your Post Office Complain. Word is that the USPS needs many complaints before they will change the FedEx contract.

We accept checks and Money orders. Email: fayrehale@gmail.com for address.

I am going to call this the year of the Crest!!

We have stopped taking orders for 2014. We will fill the orders we already have. Time to concentrate on building up our own flock.

Orders can be placed for 2015 and as with Fayrehale Chanteclers, your position on the list is determined by when payment is received.For now we plan to hold 2014 pricing. A good reason to order for 2015 now.

For the time being ALL chicks must be shipped EXPRESS Mail – This is not the USPS regulation – this is FedEx making a change in their policies — USPS has FedEx fly all Priority Packages.

We Are Getting Serious About the Icelandics!

We are getting serious enough now with our Icelandic Chicken Flock that we have started a Face Book Page. We almost have the genes for every importation (and by Fall should have the one we are missing). This breed excites us and makes a historical and colorful companion flock to our White Chanteclers. Two great heritage breeds.

Like us as we slowly build this page in preparation for the 2014 season!

Our Young Icelandic Flock in the Chicken Tractor

Is there anything more beautiful than poultry, freshly feathered for winter, glistening in the Fall sun ?

Young Icelandic Cock

Orders are filled in the order prepayment is received. I suggest people think about paying this fall and winter to secure a good place on the Spring 2014 list!

Paid orders are already coming in and the list has started.

fayrehale@gmail.com

Orders are filled in the order they were received. We will be hatching and shipping April – September — We are a small family operation and not a hatchery. Our Icelandics are of top quality and carry a nice genetic mix.

Based on some unfortunate experiences in 2012 we will not consider an order valid until we have money in hand. At that point your name goes on the list (chicks or eggs) and the order is filled in the order payment was received. Be aware that payments are already arriving.

We will start the incubator in late March and do our fertility check. Then we will start hatching to ship. PLEASE NOTE: Hatched chicks take priority over hatching eggs. We stop eating them:) so all Icelandic eggs are for production. Our incubator will run into September.

Chicks scheduled to be shipped are incubated so that they hatch on a Monday and go out the same day. They should arrived Wednesday.

A really great interview (and lots of pictures) with the lovely Jóhanna Harðardóttir, the owner of Hlésey farm and the founder and first president of the Icelandic Owners and Breeders Association in Iceland can befound here!

“Iceland chickens, better known as Viking hens, or ‘Landnamshaena’ as called there, have lived in Iceland since the settlers crossed the Atlantic ocean in the 10th Century”

Until we have our own to photograph, I have borrowed a picture from Lisa Richards of Mack Hill Farm. Lisa is one of two sources for our Icelandic stock. The second source is Muddy Hoof Farm from way Down East!

The U.S. Icelandic Chicken lines are named after their importers and are referred to as the Behl line, Sigrid’s line and Vala’s line, there may be others that I’m unaware of. The Behl line birds came from Kolsholt farm, Sigrid’s line from Steinum II and Syðstu Fossum farms and Vala’s lines are from Hlésey and Húsatóftir farms.

Vala AW posted: 97/98 was from the same farms as far as I know (Steinar II and Syðstu Fossar). In 2011 I got eggs from Hlésey that were brought to me but in 2012 I did my own import from Húsatóftir. Behl’s birds came from Kolsstaðir. Sue has birds from Hlésey.

Berrytangle Farm (Bork): are from two distinct lines. One line, the Hlésey, is a second-generation direct import from Iceland, and the second, the Húsatóftir, is a first-generation direct import.

Lisa Richards’ (Mack Hill Farm) foundation hens and roosters came from Lyle Behl’s Icelandics which he brought to the US direct from Iceland in 2003.

1998 Importation of Icelandic Chickens eggs. Sigrid Thordarson in California imported eggs from the Agricultural Research Center in Iceland that was responsible for saving the Icelandic chicken from extinction. This line has the rare blue color (as in Blue Andalusian) which produces blacks and splashes besides blues.

We were gifted with two Icelandic Roosters. We have no idea which line they come from. Once we realized how rare they are the stew pot has been off-limits. Will be interested in obtaining some breeding stock for them. We are in Northern California.

Great to hear from you Rose. We will be hatching and shipping chicks in the Spring. We look forward to helping you develop your Icelandic Flock. They are a GREAT breed. You can also follow us on Facebook —– https://www.facebook.com/fayrehaleicelandicchickens

my icelandic flock is a blend of Mack hill farms (as my two foundation hens) and Lundi from Vala. he throws amazing blues and blue mixes for me.
They have out laid my production egg layers too.

I will have some more photos uploaded on mine soon.
Somewhere in my icelandic and my swedish flower hen flock is the crested gene.. i cannot seem to express it though. grr. maybe next year with a new generation.

I LOVE my Icelandic chickens!! Very colorful and amazingly friendly. Their wild and wonderful colors are a nice balance to the white Chanteclers I received in the same shipment this spring. Love the Chanteclers, too! Thanks, Jim for making them available.

Hi, We live in a small Maine town and have a coop that is 9’X12′ and an attached run that is 16’X8′. Our hens do not free range for a variety of reasons. How would hens from this breed do with that living arrangement aka no free running? Thanks. Mary